Online Discussions: Review of a module on public education regarding LMOs

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Theme 2: Feedback on the topic on procedures and practices of public education[#8306]

POSTED ON BEHALF OF THE MODERATORS OF THE FORUM

Dear Forum Participants,

We would like to thank you for the active participation of the discussions of Theme 1.

To continue the discussion, under Theme 2, we will continue to discuss a draft text that will be developed into an e-learning module on public education regarding LMOs and has been made available as an attachment in the Online Forum. Forum participants are invited to review the draft text and then answer the guiding questions below that will be moderated.

We would like to know if this section of the module on procedures and practices of public education is in line with your national experience (e.g. comprehensive, useful, clear, applicable and/or complete)

Please have in mind that some of the materials in the text is long and will be developed into exercises, scenarios and visual materials. However, prior to that we would like to hear your comments on the text.

Lesson 1: Roles and responsibilities of public authorities and other stakeholders

1. Are the roles and responsibilities in line with your national experiences?2. What may be the general aim of the primary, secondary and tertiary stakeholders?3. In your opinion, who is or should be the primary, secondary and tertiary stakeholders?4. Would it be useful to make the good practices into an exercise or checklist or should the good practices be more integrated with the next lesson on administrative mechanisms and procedures?

Lesson 2: Administrative mechanisms and procedures

5. Are the procedures for top-down mechanism in line with your national experience? 6. Are the procedures for bottom-up mechanism in line with your national experience? 7. Could you provide statements and good practices on the importance of mainstreaming and integrating biosafety into biodiversity and other related environmental education at all levels?8. Could the general good practices for the two mechanisms be useful as a checklist or good practice?9. Could you provide good practices or case studies from your national experiences for the top-down and bottom-up approaches and mechanisms?

Lesson 3: Learning principles and teaching methods

10. Are the learning principles clear and comprehensive enough to understand the importance in using these in education and training activities?11. Are the teaching methods clear, comprehensive and useful in education and training activities?12. Could you share some benefits in your national experience of organizing training and educational activities or developing resource guides for academic institutions using learning principles and teaching methods, such as online or offline methods?

Please note that the discussions for Theme 2 is from 10 April 2017 (9:00 a.m. EDT) to 14 April 2017 (5:00 p.m. EDT).

Please note that participants must register and sign into the BCH in order to post messages.

Individuals wishing to participate via e-mail after these initial messages can choose to “watch” the discussions taking place under the different themes. These individuals will then receive copies of the posted messages by e-mail.

We look forward to reading your suggestions and comments.

We would also like to announce that the importance of participating in the other modules to understand how the final product of the module will be developed as a storyboard and to ensure that you may be selected to upcoming workshops on the priority areas/activities of the programme of work. Please find the link to these modules at https://scbd.unssc.org/course/index.php?categoryid=9

Theme 2: Feedback on the topic on procedures and practices of public education[#8310]

Dear participants,

This week we have the opportunity to share our experience on procedures and practices in public education in biosafety.This subject is not easy to access, since human beings are not spontaneously procedural, we are not inclined to identify the components of the hierarchical line followed by a "Top-Down" procedure. Yet it is extremely important to identify these different levels when advocating for public education, in order to be able to interact effectively with them when we want to go back to political decision-makers in a bottom-up procedure. It is only in this direction that citizen action can be exercised.While it is easy to identify primary (at governmental) and secondary (in educational institutions) stakeholders, it is sometimes much less easy to identify tertiary stakeholders who may be very diverse groups who do not necessarily collaborate. To give just one example, in Belgium the government's technical expert on biosafety is also the focal point for Article 17-19 and 20 of the Cartagena Protocol is the Institute of Public Health (IPH) /http://www.biosafetyprotocol.be/FP.html. While this service is in charge of the biosafety protocol http://www.biosafetyprotocol.be/, it is the Royal Institute of Natural Sciences (RINS) that is in charge of the management of the secretariat of the convention of biodiversity. Thus, on the one hand, biosafety experts at IPH are more at the service of LMO users / producers, while biodiversity "keepers" are generally more in contact with the general public (exhibitions, conferences, etc.), but have little or no knowledge of LMOs and biosafety. Ideally, these two bodies should intensify their collaboration in public education projects.

The last lesson of this module focuses on the types of pedagogical approaches that could be developed. However, most people interested in the education of the public are more motivated by the pedagogical objectives and effectiveness of education in terms of public awareness than by teaching methods per se. This cleavage highlights the major difficulties of this type of project and more precisely to allow the efficacious collaboration of different expert groups: pedagogues, political decision-makers who may not be interested in pedagogical aspects and field actors eager to transmit knowledge, but who are perhaps not in phase with either the pedagogues or the political decision-makers. While it is clear that public education should rather be based on an informal (if possible on the internet) and modular approach (allowing learners to progress at his/her own pace), the project must involve communication specialists. Moreover, it requires the collaboration of the 3 stakeholder levels, which implies having identified all the actors of the tertiary level to ensure sweeping away all aspects of the issue. As aforementioned this identification is not always easy.

I would be happy to learn your opinion about my analysis of this second theme.

RE: Theme 2: Feedback on the topic on procedures and practices of public education[#8317]

Dear Participants

Greetings! Following are some observation on Theme 2 based on national experience.

LESSON 1: ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF PUBLIC AUTHORITIES AND OTHER STAKEHOLDERS

1. Are the roles and responsibilities in line with your national experiences?

Yes.

As per India’s experience we may include Alumina, Entrepreneurs and Employers in the tertiary stakeholders.

In today’s scenario, alumni relations are an important part of an institution's progress for many reasons. They enhance fundraising opportunities, they bring in benefits from new skills, experience and share the institutions achievement in the social and global networking. In India, many accomplished alumni are serving as think tanks to the Government and public institutions. They are a role model for various start-ups.

Currently, there is demand from enrolled students and professionals already in employment, for developing skills to enhance their employability. Similarly, there is also a growing awareness among leaders and senior managers on the importance of entrepreneurship and enterprise education for future employability and job creation. Indian educational institutions are trying to adapt to this current need by incorporating skill development, enterprise education or entrepreneurship in their programs. These situations provide new platforms and opportunities for integrating biosafety.

2. What may be the general aim of the primary, secondary and tertiary stakeholders?

Aim of the primary, secondary and tertiary stakeholders is to provide an enabling environment through appropriate legal framework &, guidelines, provide adequate budget, develop structured inter and intra agency coordination mechanism to avoid overlaps, develop policies and programs which integrate international scientific developments and mechanisms for time bound review.The objective is to ensure that national biosafety education and training programs focus on developing in-country expertise for effective environmental and food safety assessment, management and communication on biosafety issues in a manner understandable to different categories of stakeholders.

3. In your opinion, who is or should be the primary, secondary and tertiary stakeholders?

Primary stakeholders: Government organizations comprising of Ministries and departments involved in biosafety regulation, research and education as well as those engaged in developing science and technology policies and program.

Secondary Stakeholder: Public institutions involved in the implementation of various Acts related to education, science and technology, agriculture, health & environment; agencies/institutions /committees involved in formal education; academia; research institutions both public and private; judiciary.

Sustainable improvements in the educational scenario can take place only with the active participation of all key stakeholders – all need to be involved in proactive partnerships. This calls for capacity enhancement that can facilitate informed dialogue and action so that educational reforms can be taken in a timely manner. In this context, I suggest we include a fourth category of Stakeholder namely “Beneficiaries”.

4. Would it be useful to make the good practices into an exercise or checklist or should the good practices be more integrated with the next lesson on administrative mechanisms and procedures?

Preferably in the form of an exercise through a case study. It would be useful if the case study highlights how sustainability was achieved or can be achieved.

LESSON 2: ADMINISTRATIVE MECHANISMS AND PROCEDURES

5. Are the procedures for top-down mechanism in line with your national experience? &6. Are the procedures for bottom-up mechanism in line with your national experience?

The procedures for the top-down and bottom-up are in line with the national experience for various educational program. However, biosafety being relatively new, has not received much attention in the formal education system.

7. Could you provide statements and good practices on the importance of mainstreaming and integrating biosafety into biodiversity and other related environmental education at all levels?

Mainstreaming is extremely important for several reasons - garners Political will, improves informed decision making, enhance trust in Government’s decision, people will have access to validated and reliable information, improve the inhouse capacity of professional risk assessors, promote public awareness on biosafety, improve infrastructure and human resource capacity for LMO detection, generates baseline information on biodiversity/ natural resources, useful in identifying gap areas, possibility of improved resource commitments or rather resource optimization, integration of biodiversity concerns in the economic and social development agenda, facilitates implementation of commitments under CBD, CBP, Nagoya Protocol on ABS.

8. Could the general good practices for the two mechanisms be useful as a checklist or good practice?

Good Practices.

9. Could you provide good practices or case studies from your national experiences for the top-down and bottom-up approaches and mechanisms?

a. India has a legal framework for regulating LMOs. The role and responsibilities of the regulators are well defined in the legislation and guidelines. b. Ministries, departments, research institutions, involved in development of policies and programs related to science and technology, biotechnology, human and animal health, agriculture etc have been identified. c. Role of enforcement agencies in the import and export of biological materials including food is well defined. Gaps and areas of strengthening in the context of LMOs and biosecurity have been identified. d. The recent National Biotechnology Development Strategy 2015-2020 formulated by the Department of Biotechnology focuses on promoting bioscience research, education and entrepreneurship. This initiative is envisaged to provide a structured biotechnology and biosafety program. e. The National Biodiversity Action Plan, 2008 and addendum 2014 has identified public awareness, education on biodiversity conservation, management and detection of LMOs as one of the 12 National Biodiversity targets to meet commitments under AICHI Targets. f. Ministry of Environment, Forests & Climate Change has undertaken several capacity building programs to enhance awareness on biosafety through training programs, development of resource materials and e-learning modules for CFT. The stakeholders involved include administrator, regulators, scientists, researchers, media, plant quarantine, customs, seed inspector, food inspectors, State Biodiversity Boards. g. The training programs focused on risk assessment & management, LMO detection, public awareness and importance of communication. h. Module on commitments under CBD and CPB and BCH as a repository of information on LMOs is an integral part of the training and awareness program on biosafety organized in India.i. As part of regional co-operation, India has organized several workshops including the hosting of CoP 6 which provided a platform for sharing experiences, identifying capacity building needs and dissemination of resource material. India also participated in the CEPA Fair during CoP-MoP 7 and CoP-MoP 8

However, these programs have been on an Ad-hoc basis depending on availability of resources. A more structured and decentralized approach is necessary to mainstream public education, awareness and participation into NBSAPs and other environmental programs.

LESSON 3: LEARNING PRINCIPLES AND TEACHING METHODS

10. Are the learning principles clear and comprehensive enough to understand the importance in using these in education and training activities? Yes,

11. Are the teaching methods clear, comprehensive and useful in education and training activities? Yes.

12. Could you share some benefits in your national experience of organizing training and educational activities or developing resource guides for academic institutions using learning principles and teaching methods, such as online or offline methods?

Online Teaching Tools:

The National Mission on Education (Vision 2030) combined with the Digital India program is focusing on providing technology driven educational system. As part of this initiative, the National Council on Education and Research and Training has developed e-resources (from class 1 to XII) including textbooks, audio, video, periodicals and a variety of other print and non-print materials through website and mobile app. for showcasing and disseminating all educational materials. All the concerned stakeholders such as students, teachers, educators and parents can access e-books through multiple technology platforms i.e. mobile phones (android, ios and windows platforms), and tablets (as e-pub) and on web through laptops and desktops (as flipbooks). Currently the e-contents are available in Hindi, English and Urdu. This facility is being extended to all States/ UTs in the regional languages in a phased manner.

A similar exercise has been initiated for the postgraduate education program. The University Grants Commission is developing e-content in 77 subjects across all disciplines of social sciences, arts, fine arts & humanities, natural & mathematical sciences, life sciences linguistics and languages.

Offline Learning Tools:

Several initiatives are underway to improve the quality and access to traditional classes room style education. The online learning is an extension of classical forms of learning. It is accepted that not even the best online courses especially at the school level can fully replace traditional methods which provides for all round personality growth and human relationships that develop in a group through personal interaction with a teacher , other students or societal groups from diverse backgrounds.

Biosafety Learning tool:

As far as the biosafety capacity building initiatives are concerned, class room style training combined with online e-resources have been used. The resource materials and related links have also been made available in the BCH. Some of the resource materials have been translated into 8 regional languages.

posted on 2017-04-15 15:41 UTC by Dr. Ranjini Warrier, India

RE: Theme 2: Feedback on the topic on procedures and practices of public education[#8318]

Thanks Dr. Ranjini for your contribution. Taking from here, I encourage also other stakeholders from the Asia-Pacific Region to take part in the discussion to be able to solicit a comprehensive feedback on said theme, and other themes to follow.

Ruel

posted on 2017-04-16 07:09 UTC by Dr. Ruel Maningas, Colegio de San Juan de Letran

RE: Theme 2: Feedback on the topic on procedures and practices of public education[#8320]

RE: Theme 2: Feedback on the topic on procedures and practices of public education[#8324]

Dear All,

First of all I would like to thank Ulrika for drafting the training module for public education. The structure of the module involves multiple components and functions that made it very useful and overarching for each country, even the countries have unique educational system and various practices.

It was interesting to learn from the reach experience of Belgium and India thanks to Suzanne Loret’s and Ranjini Warrier’s contributions to this forum. Thank you.

Based on the Moldova’s practices in biosafety public education, I would mention that the biosafety being relatively new, has not received much attention in the formal education system.However a number of good practices and legislative and administrative efforts made possible to reach good success in general understanding of the biosafety topic and provide awareness for decision makers, sectorial people, business, agriculture and mass media.

In case of Moldova, the Ministry of Education is the main public authority responsible for formal educational process staring from the pre-scholar level, primary school education, gymnasium and lyceum education, professional (technical) education, university education and post-university education levels. The formal education is developed under the Educational Code that is the horizontal legal act. A number of informal educations are available, ex. extracurricular activities, trainings and workshops, clubs, Olympiads, thematic concourses, student conferences, summer schools and summer professional practices, study tours etc. are available and provide good support to maintain interest and motivation of children and students. The university curricula development and the organization of extracurricular or informal education is the privilege of universities, as the decentralized administration. In this sense I would consider the university administration to classify as the primary category of stakeholders which can play important role for promoting educational practices in biosafety.

The topic of Biosafety is raised by the Law on Biosafety (2001), art. 39 and the draft Law on GMOs (now is under approval in the Parliament) and stipulates requirement for public information, education and public participation to decision making. Following this requirement, the Ministry of Environment, as the national competent biosafety authority, organizing a number of workshops, press conferences, seminars and meetings with the topic of Biosafety, in cooperation with the academia and universities. However, this activity is not undertaken at a regular base, and is due to availability of financial support, as external as well as extra-budgetary.

A number of universities have developing a special biosafety courses within the university curricula on molecular biology program for undergraduate education, master degree and doctoral degree. As example, several university course are teaching in the State University of Moldova, Biology faculty that are related to Biosafety issues: the GMOs course - for license level, Biosafety and sustainable development – for master degree students, Classic and modern biotechnology course for undergraduate students etc. Since 2016 a new curricula for master degree – Biosafety – has been developed to have a multidisciplinary approach and involve students and lecturers from molecular biology, genetics, environmental studies, animal and human biology, geography, botany and zoology, microbiology etc. It is consulted and submitted for approval. A number of initiatives to expand biosafety education through the student mobility programs, as well as bilateral and regional cooperation have been undertaken.

As regards to the educational materials, there are limited resources to ensure the educational process. It is urgent need to produce training materials, manuals, books with the topic of biosafety in the national language to be available and accessible for educational scopes. E-learning would be very much useful to be developed. The proposed educational tool would be very welcome to use and apply for these activities in the country.

To establish good coordination and cross sectorial cooperation between the environmental sector as well as educational, agricultural, health care and other sectors, as well as top-down and down-top mechanisms are strongly necessary to improve and mainstream the biosafety education in all relevant areas and contribute to improve professional knowledge and skills of personnel and regulators.

The educational tool is in line with the NBSAP provisions under the objective B, that request establishment of a Center of public information on biodiversity and biosafety and to promote biodiversity and biosafety education and professional skills.

The national BCH system may serve to the scope of public information and education. Availability of educational tooks through the BCH on-line can contribute for formal and in-formal education on specific biosafety topics, and accessible for political level to universities and schools.

The proposed tool, the topic 2 is very much useful and helpful, is according with the country educational system and country needs.

RE: Theme 2: Feedback on the topic on procedures and practices of public education[#8325]

First, I’d like to thank for the opportunity to participate in this forum and to thank for all the contributions made so far. It is a very important topic and it needs careful consideration and development to achieve its goals in an effective way. Potential environmental and health risks associated with LMOs, must be seen in the context. The e-learning platform when talking about the importance of public access to information (module 1) mentions the importance about making known the potential risks to the environment and human health but it does not refer to the potential or already known benefits for the environment and human health associated with biotechnology. In order to improve the quality of decisions on LMOs it is equally important to make it clear the benefits associated with biotechnology as it is to consider the potential risks. Both aspect should come next to each other with equal importance. The e-learning platform is a nice initiative and thoughtful review should be done.One of the questions is to provide examples of good practices. Though there’s probably the need to increase and develop material for different target audiences and different objectives to achieve public awareness, education, participation, access to information… in an effective and wise way. If one looks at the list of Capacity Building Activities, Projects and Opportunities mentioned in the documents provided for this forum, linkhttp://bch.cbd.int/database/results?searchid=664162 This list is very small, it does not reflect the available opportunities and some of the resources are outdated (there is example of courses that were for instance, offered a decade ago and do not run any longer and they are not obvious from the list until you dig into the linked information). While there are gaps in the public education and awareness initiatives to be worked on. It would be important to have a better overview of the existing opportunities, their scope, aim and target audience, as well as up-to-date possibilities. As an example of good practice for the general public, Cornell university offers a free online MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) once a year https://www.edx.org/course/science-politics-gmo-cornellx-gmo101x that explains the meaning of GMOs (LMOs inclusive), etc. in an easy to understand way, with the aid of explanatory videos, additional reading material and the possibility of online discussions. It is a content that would be accessible to lay audience with internet access but it is not listed in the BCH. This year the ICGEB (The International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology) has offered a course on “Risk Analysis for the release of GMOs into the environment” and some of their workshops’ and courses’ presentations are made available online including as podcasts and videos which could also benefit a wider number of professionals who could not attend the event if it were better known. This is again an example of a relevant scientific resource, for a specific aim and target audience, not listed on the BCH. We should think of ways to promote the sharing of educational/capacity building opportunities through the BCH. In addition, the BCH should offer better ways to search and filter for Capacity Building Activities, Projects and Opportunities. One could consider having possibilities to quickly screen characteristics such as language, costs/availability of grants, target audience, aim, whether it’s still available…best wishes, Lúcia de Souza

RE: Theme 2: Feedback on the topic on procedures and practices of public education[#8326]

Dear Ms. Lúcia de Souza,I would like to thank you for your contribution to the forum and very good point that participants should think of ways to promote the sharing of educational and capacity-building opportunities through the BCH, including the Capacity-building project database (http://bch.cbd.int/database/activities/). I support this and kindly ask for the participants to update and make records in the database on a constant base, including the category for Accredited Biosafety Courses, Projects and Opportunities and make information about such opportunity available for your colleagues in your countries.It should be also mentioned that participants can update and make records on educational materials in the Biosafety Information Resource Center at http://bch.cbd.int/database/results?searchid=676672 and at http://bch.cbd.int/database/results?searchid=676698 (universities and institutions).